George Catlin Found

I said my next Blog was going to be about George Catlin, and here it is 3 years later.  Work, age, life, fear:  they all played a part in not contributing to this blog and letting it languish.


I'm thinking it's time to wake up and start thinking again.  I think (think) I got a little afraid of other people's opinions as I expressed mine.  I'm not trying to change anyone's way of thinking, I'm just wanting to - express!




So, George Catlin.



Several years ago, my great aunts, Blanch Jacobs, who has since passed away, and Lillie Fitzsimmons, who is still alive (in her 90's) and wondering why, were moving from Kaysville, UT to  St. George of the same state.  They wanted to get rid of some stuff and let me have my pick from a pile of books.  Among those were a 2 volume set by George.  "Letters and Notes on the North American Indians."  I really did not know what it was about, but I took the two volumes and a few more books.




Some months later, wanting something to read during my commute on the train, I hurriedly grabbed the first volume and ran out the door.




I was completely surprised to find that this man had traveled up the Missouri River on the first steamboat to do so, for the sole purpose of documenting the American Indian.  This was 1836.  I was fascinated on how he got this bee in his bonnet to do this.  It was an idea that dogged him and the only person who encouraged him to go on this journey with his paints and canvases and journals and ink, was Governor Clark, of Lewis and Clark fame. 




Not only was I surprised, I was fascinated at the life and times of the plains Indians in the early 1800's as he documented them in words and paintings.  Gratefully, the Smithsonian has all of his paintings and these are still used today for research and study.  No one else even thought to do such a thing.




There were several things in the writings of George Catlin that I found very interesting.


1.  The story of a warrior and a javelin
2.  The Mandan Indian and the Welsh
3.  Grapes on the wild frontier
4.  Oysters 300 miles from the ocean.




Next time:  The story of the warrior and the javelin and what I find so interesting about that.

The Circle and the Square:

Why was I interested in this stone?: because I’d seen it before. 

Here are four stones, placed precisely together creating a cross, connected by the carved circle.  It was, perhaps, one of the more interesting things I found at Chitzen Itza.  And I found it by happenstance.  I was not on the beaten path, but was wandering among the trees and ruins of this lost and abandoned city doing my own exploring before having to head back to the bus.

It immediately made me think of the Celtic Crosses of Ireland.

 

 

When the film, Hidalgo, came out in 2004, I was equally intrigued by the necklace the main character, Frank Hopkins, wore as a reminder of his North American Plaines Indian heritage.

 

Was there any connection between Central America, North America and Europe?  As I did a little internet digging, I came across several websites, but I liked this one best, http://symboldictionary.net/?p=784.  I found out that this symbol is not only very old, it’s global, associated with a myriad of ancient religions.  It is often referred to as the Solar Cross, depicting the turning of the year, or, as with some North American Indians, with the ages of Man - infancy, youth, middle age and old age.

That this symbol is associated with so many ancient religions seems obvious.  What is more basic than a circle and a straight line?  Just go into any store that sells drafting equipment.  You will find equipment to will help you draw a perfect circle and a perfect square, or cross.  With these basics, you can draw anything, build anything.  That symbol was used to help people build and define their lives, so no wonder it’s everywhere – it’s likely been around since the very beginning.

So I shouldn’t wonder at it.  If it’s an ancient religious symbol, if people traveled far and wide then as they do now, as the Book of Mormon attests, that symbol would be all over the world. 

And so it is, and I find that very interesting.

Next time:  North American Indians & George Catlin

The Case for the Book of Mormon in Central America

I had to go digging this morning for the pictures I wanted, but I found them.  I can’t believe it’s been 10 years since my trip to Mexico and the Riviera Maya.  I went with my friend, Michelle Krugar, the first of several trips we have taken together over the years since.

 

Michelle was very keen to see the ruins of Central America and connect them to the Book of Mormon.  Although I had read several books and articles on the subject, I had become skeptical.  Nevertheless, I smiled and swam and ate and spent money and enjoyed the trip.  I did, however, learn a few things of interest.

We visited Tulum, an interesting ruin on the coast, south of Playa Del Carmen where our resort was. 

We even visited Chitzen Itza, the grand-daddy of archeological sites on the Yucatan Peninsula. 

 

I wasn’t surprised to learn that all these sites were from the later periods, 1000 A.D. to 1500 A.D.  In fact the earliest indicators for these people seem to be that they moved into the area around 400-500 A.D. at a time of massive migrations and movements of people.

I also found a people obsessed with the heart.  In this little temple in Tulum, just above the door you see the figure of a man, upside down, head and hands toward the opening.  You can’t see it in this photo, but the tour guide explained that in this man’s hands is a human heart.

 

We look at the Maya and the Aztec as a bloodthirsty people, who captured their enemies and cut their hearts out, offering them to their bloodthirsty gods.  What an apostate twist - a literal interpretation of the admonition to “offer your heart” unto God.  I can just hear these blind people asking, “How do we offer our hearts to god?” and some wicked tyrant, in a bid to control his people and expand his territory insist it was literal, “but if your good, we’ll get a proxy for you.  We’ll defeat our enemies, take their lands and offer their hearts for yours.” 

There are two principles here, and both are Christian.  One, the need to give God your heart so that He can heal you, and, Two, proxy work.  Both of these principles are evident in the New Testament when Christ admonished his disciples to love God with all their “hearts,” and when Paul declares to the Corinthians “Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all?”  Anciently, there was obviously proxy baptism for the dead.

And, of course, the greatest proxy work of all was when Christ offered himself a ransom for our sins.

The case for Central America being the land of the Book of Mormon is interesting, and there are those who are absolutely certain that it is so.  I’m still skeptical.  What I found was a people who had known the light, had fallen and migrated, bringing their apostate ideas with them to the Yucatan.

 

But where did they migrate from?  Well, here's an interesting stone I found amidst the ruins of Chitzan Itza.  We’ll take a closer look at it next time.

 

 

Exploring the Lands of the Book of Mormon: Introduction

Just do a search on any on-line search engine for “Book of Mormon Lands” and a whole slew of options become available.  There are a lot of opinions out there.  So before I throw my 2 cents worth into the mix, I just want to make one thing perfectly clear.  The location of events of the Book of Mormon don’t matter one bit to me.  Like the Bible, the Book of Mormon is a book of faith.  God’s ways are not man’s ways.  Men want evidence they can hold, measure, taste, touch and see.  God’s ways are ways of the heart.  Truth is a feeling.

What I want to share here is not any proof about where the Book of Mormon lands are.  As I said, that doesn’t matter.  It’s more about my journey through ideas that have come to my attention.  Things that I think are simply interesting.

Let’s start with my earliest recollections and research about the lands and cultures of the Book of Mormon peoples.

I remember as a teenager reading one book that believed the Book of Mormon lands were in South America.  Interestingly enough, years later I read in a book, (this was a couple of decades ago so I don’t remember what book, I’m afraid) that some of the Pre-Columbian inhabitants practiced circumcision.  The scholar who wrote the book was at a loss as to explain how the locals had acquired this practice.  “Hmm,” I thought, “isn’t that an ancient Isrealite practice?”  This same scholar claimed that the peoples of the kingdoms of western South America had a flowering in their culture, a golden era, of advances in agriculture, medicine and art in the first three centuries A.D.  Well, that’s about the right time period.  I found that interesting.

Later, things began to deteriorate.  In the lost desert kingdoms of Peru, thousands of pieces of sculpture have been dug up from the sand.  A lot of it was of portrait mugs, (the artist really caught the personalities in many of them) but most of the sculptures were erotica.  It turned out to be the largest cache of ancient erotica ever unearthed.  I left that book in the car, not daring to bring it into my house.  That kingdom was absolutely wiped off the face of the earth, and is now nothing but a desert.  Nobody lives there anymore.  In fact, all the great civilizations of all the Americas, North, Central and South, are no more.

There is a lot to be learned about the lost civilizations of South America, the land of the Incas and the tribes along the Amazon River.  Hundreds of books have been written, thousands of articles and on-line web pages.  I long ago discarded South America as a possible site for the lands of the Book of Mormon, but I do believe that they were influenced by the scattered remnants.  Why else would the last Inca king call himself the Son of God?

I find those influences particularly interesting.

Next:  More exploring!

Searching for Israel and Finding the Arthurian Legends - Summary

Well, this has been a journey, and I appreciate the opportunity to share these thoughts and ideas.  I’m sure more thoughts will crop up in the future, like ‘What is the Holy Grail?’ and Percival vs. Galahad, will the real finder of the Holy Grail please stand up. 

It’s important to know who you and where you come from.  It’s important to know that God loves His children and keeps His promises.  Researching this material brought out a great excitement in me.  It wasn’t just the excitement of discovery, but the excitement to know:  this is who I am, this is where I came from.  My ancestors came from Scotland, Isle of Man, Wales, and other parts of England.  They also came from Norway, The Netherlands and the northern parts of France where the Bretons had fled to in the aftermath of war with the Saxons.

There was something important going on in those Islands and God really did have dealings with them, though time and history have dimmed the truth. 

Nothing was left to chance.

I’m Israel.   I’m of the house of Israel.  I’m of the house of Ephraim and I don’t think it’s just by adoption.  Sure, there’s a mingling of different lines, but there’s enough that God remembered His promises to His servants, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, that He would bring Israel out of obscurity, renew the covenant and bring His church out of obscurity and into the light. 

The Children of Israel were not chosen to be special and above everyone else.  They were chosen to be the least, the most humble, the servants of all.  They were chosen to bear the gospel to all the world, that all the nations of the earth might be blessed, that all the world would be Israel, the covenant people of the God.

When that happens, there truly will be a thousand years of peace.

Next:  Shall we explore Book of Mormon lands?

Gildas the Sage: Part Six

Last year, when I was hosting an educational program on the Mormon Channel called, “Insights,” I interviewed Dr. C. Wilfred Griggs on Christianity in the fourth and fifth century A.D. Egypt.  During this interview I learned the distinction between the “Apostles,” “The Apostolic Fathers,” and “The Church Fathers.”  Of course, the “Apostles” are the original 12 Apostles whom the Lord called to lead His church and take the gospel to all the world.  The “Apostolic Fathers” come later, during the 4^th and 5^th centuries.  In my interview with Dr. Griggs, it became clear these Apostolic Fathers still understood many correct and original truths, but they KNEW the church was in serious decline and a state of apostasy from the original teachings of the Savior and His Apostles.  When we get to the Church Fathers, the apostasy appears to be complete.

In my view, Gildas of Great Britain, writing in the mid-sixth century, can be classified with the Apostolic Fathers.   And perhaps he was something more.

When I finally understood what he was telling the clergy of his day, that if they did not change and repent, doing what they were supposed to be doing as Shepherds of the Lord, they would lose revelation, and loose the Church, I flipped towards the end of his book to see how he would wrap this up.

And here is what he wrote that just amazed me.

“I am clear and clean from the blood of all: for I have not forborne to declare unto you all the counsel of God.” 

I’ve tried to look this phrase up in the Old and New Testament, but I’m only finding it in LDS cannon.  Gildas claims he is quoting an apostle.  Where ever it may come from, it is definitely here in the works of Gildas, and I find that extremely significant.  It is such a Book of Mormon thing to say!  Look it up in Mosiah, chapter 2.  King Benjamin, a righteous, God fearing man, proclaims the gospel to his people, teaches the right way to live and behave, then says in verse 28:

“I say unto you that I have caused that ye should assemble yourselves together that I might rid my garments of your blood, at this period of time when I am about to go down to my grave, that I might go down in peace, and my immortal spirit may join the choirs above in singing the praises of a just God.”

Gildas does everything a prophet does. 

1.       He warns the people of their sins.

2.       He tells them what they are doing wrong.

3.       He admonishes them to turn to Christ, to repent.

4.       He warns them of the consequences of their actions.

5.       He rids his garments of their blood. 

Shortly after Gildas publishes his warning book, according to the Book of Saints, he becomes an aesthetic and lives on a rocky island somewhere in the English Channel until some fishermen find him and take him to France.  He lives in a cave near a river, then, towards the end of his life, about 565 A.D., he is rumored to go to Ireland.  By all accounts, he dies in the year 570 A.D. 

Personally, I think, like John the Apostle, Gildas was exiled to his rocky island and the fishermen rescued him.  And he is not the only prophet during desperate times to spend part of his life living in a cave.  Ether is the first that comes to mind, and probably Mormon and Moroni as well. 

I shall end my essay on Gildas with this.  A few years ago, I came across this passage in the Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible.  It’s in Revelation, chapter 12, the one about the woman being forced to flee into the wilderness where God had a place prepared for her for a period of time.  In verse 5, Joseph Smith changed “a thousand two hundred and threescore days” to “years.”  Well, my little brain started thinking about that and I took out a calculator.  I knew the gospel had been restored in the year 1830.  The Church of Christ was starting to come out of obscurity.  So I took that number, subtracted 1260 and got… 

570 A.D.   

The year the Church went INTO obscurity.  The same year Gildas is reported to have died.   

And I just find that extremely interesting!

To listen to my interview with Dr. C. Wilfred Griggs, “Christianity in Egypt,” visit mormonchannel.org/insights/9.

Gildas the Sage: Part Five

“Britain hath priests, but they are unwise; very many that minister, but many of them impudent; clerks she hath, but certain of them are deceitful raveners; pastors (as they are called) but rather wolves prepared for the slaughter of souls (for they provide not for the good of the common people, but covet rather the gluttony of their own bellies), possessing the houses of the church, but obtaining them for filthy lucre’s sake; instructing the laity, but showing withal most depraved examples, vices and evil manners; seldom sacrificing, and seldom with clean hearts;…”

Gildas goes on and on an on with pages and pages of examples of wrongdoings by the clergy of his day.  Following is the Reader’s Digest Condensed list of sins he claimes they have committed.

1.       “Reverencing the sinful rich man,”

2.       “Concealing the horrible sins of the people, and amplifying injuries offered unto  themselves,”

3.       “Seeking rather ambitiously for ecclesiastical dignities than for the kingdom of heaven,”

4.       “Diligent and attentive to the plays and foolish fables of secular men, as if they were the very ways to life,…”

5.       “Slothful and dumb in the Apostolic decrees,”

6.       “…so sinful as after the example of Simon Magus…with earthly price to purchase the office of a bishop or priest,”

7.       “…of sinners, they make them not penitents…”

8.       They go overseas and travel in many countries, get some education then come home and set themselves up to show off their accomplishments (paraphrased). 

Where Gildas was pretty blunt with the kings, he is brutal to the bishops and priests. 

Part of the problem, I believe, comes from the caste system the Celts had lived under for centuries.   Old traditions are hard to get rid of.  Just as the Greeks slipped Greek philosophy into Christian teachings, the Bretons had a hard time giving up their old ways as well. 

This caste system is very similar to the caste system found in India, though perhaps not as strict. 

A.      The priestly caste.  The highest caste, where the order of the Druids is found.

B.      The warrior caste.  These were the kings and generals and other military men.

C.      The merchant cast.  Those who sold and traded goods.

D.      The farmer caste.  Those who worked the land.

The Celtic caste system was not necessarily hereditary.  As I understand it, people could move around in the caste system depending on their talents.  But I’m sure the Druidic order had its influences on the Celtic Christian Church.  The Druids were pretty much gone by the late 400s A.D.  Were they all slaughtered?  Did they scatter and wither away?  Or were they converted to this Christianity?  We don’t know, but the similarities between the Druidic order and the Levitical order bear some further study.

Regardless of the influences and problems, it is evident by Gildas words that the church in Britain is in a severe state of apostasy, of walking down the wrong path.  The bishops and priests had turned from humbly serving to pompously self-serving.

Once again, Gildas uses the scriptures to condemn the priests.   They do not follow the examples the  Abraham, he accuses them, or Joseph of Egypt or Moses, or any of the prophets.  He quotes scripture after scripture, waiving a warning flag.  In fact there were so many scriptures I got impatient.  “I get it!  I get it!” I exclaimed.  And what did I get?

“Woe be to the pastors who destroy and rend in pieces the flock of my pasture, saith our Lord.  Thus, therefore saith our Lord God of Israel, unto the pastors who guide my people, Ye have dispersed my flock, and cast them forth, and not visited them.  Behold I will visit upon you the malice of your endeavors.”

“Behold, the days shall come, saith our Lord, and I will send out a famine upon the earth; not the famine of bread, nor the thirst of water, but a famine in the hearing the word of God, and the waters shall be moved from sea to sea and they shall run over from the north even unto the east seaking the word of our Lord, and shall not find it.”

These were the kinds of scriptures Gildas was quoting.  In essence, he was telling them that if they did not repent and do what they were supposed to be doing, they were going to lose the church and lose the gift of revelation and truth. 

Gildas foresaw the great apostasy to come.

By 600 A.D., the church in Rome, after several attempts over the last two hundred years, finally succeeded in taking over the church in the British Isles.  The Celtic Christian church ceased to exist, being absorbed into the Church of Rome, becoming the Roman Catholic Church.

Next:  “I am clear and clean from the blood of all:”